


Broken Windows (Hiatus)

by orphan_account



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Abusive John Winchester, Alternate Universe - Human, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bobby's Good Parenting, Doctor Castiel, FBI Agent Dean Winchester, Hospitalization, Hurt/Comfort, Insanity, M/M, Madness, Mental Health Issues, Mental Institutions, Mute Sam Winchester, Nurse Madison, Nurse Meg, Nurse Ruby, On Hiatus, Patient Gabriel, Patient Sam, Psychological Trauma, Scared Sam, Schizophrenia, Slow Build, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Trickster Gabriel, pre-destiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-27
Updated: 2014-04-27
Packaged: 2018-01-20 21:56:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1527116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mental Hospital AU! After John Winchester killed his wife, he dragged his sons all over America and taught them to be killers. When Dean is eighteen, he turns his father in, in hopes that he can save his fourteen year old brother from him. But the damage had already been done. Five years of living with Bobby Singer up in South Dakota did nothing to help, and they were finally forced to send Sam to a renowned psychiatric hospital, where he would likely spend the rest of his life.</p><p>Gabriel Novak is one of the last four surviving members of the Novak family. After Gabriel was forced to watch his entire family massacre each other, he and his brother, Castiel, were sent to live with their uncle Chuck Shurley. Castiel was able to adjust to his new life fairly well, but Gabriel's mind had snapped. They send him to the Carver Edlund Adult Psychiatric Hospital.</p><p>Two broken boys with two very different stories, but very similar delusions, are given a chance to live again after a chance meeting. And maybe, just maybe, everything will turn out okay.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken Windows (Hiatus)

**~*~~*~~*~~*~**

**Title:** Broken Windows

 **Rating:** Mature/Explicit

 **Fandom:** Supernatural

 **Pairing:** Sam/Gabriel ...Minor Cas/Dean Pre-Slash

 **Themes:** Insanity, Romance, Slow Burn

 **Summary:** Sam and Gabriel are patients at the renowned Carver Edlund Adult Psychiatric Hospital who meet, and later become roommates. The road to love is a long and bumpy road, but they may manage to save each other in the end.

**~*~*~*~*~**

Chapter One - Down the Rabbit Hole

\--

June 03, 2002

\--

_Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock._

_Scratch. Scratch. SCRATCH. Scratch._

_Tap. Tap. Tap tap. Tap._

Empty hazel eyes stare at the moving hands of the wall clock, shifting fearfully at every little noise. The nineteen year old's uncle scratches away at a pile of papers, a small frown marring his gruff face. Hazel eyes meet the candy apple green of his brother, and he flinches away, hiding his face behind a long brunette curtain. His brother winces, reaching for him comfortingly, but it only causes him to jerk away with scared eyes. The man curls in on himself, drawing his knees to his chin, and wrapping his arms around them. The two others sigh mournfully, before the spiky haired blonde drops his arm awkwardly to his side, not sure what to do.

"It's okay Sammy." Dean says, his voice wavering a little. His brother flinches, curling tighter into himself and starting to rock back and forth slightly. It is kind of crazy how he can even fit in the chair, given that he is ridiculously tall with awkward limbs, but it hardly seems to matter.

Carver Edlund Adult Psychiatric Hospital is a small white and grey building with navy blue bold lettering announcing what it is. It is innocuous and bland, and the inside gives no impression of warmth. The walls are white, the floors light grey, and the windows have bars. Light blue leather chairs sit in the clinical waiting room, not particularly comfortable, but not unbearable either. It doesn't look like anything much, but the small New Orleans hospital is renowned across America. If anyone has any chance of healing Sam, Dean is sure it is the doctors at the Hospital.

Bobby stands, walking over to the desk and handing the signed papers to a nurse. A few words are exchanged, too quiet for either of the brothers to hear, despite the fact that both strain their ears to do so. Bobby walks back over to them both, and a few seconds later a pretty blonde nurse in pink scrubs comes into the waiting room. "Samuel Winchester?" She calls, and the man flinches and tries to make himself smaller. Bobby waves her over.

"Hi Sam." She says softly, her voice sweet and low. "My name is Meg. Can you come with me please?"

Sam looks uncertainly at her, scooting a bit closer to his brother, and shooting him a look. Dean and Bobby give him encouraging looks, nodding and giving him smiles to show its okay. The tall brunette untangles his long legs, and nods hesitantly, getting up from the pale blue chair and curling his arms tightly around himself. He shuffles silently after her, shooting scared and betrayed looks over his shoulder after realizing his brother and Uncle won’t be following him.

Dean swallows his sorrow as he watches the short haired woman lead his brother behind closed doors. Bobby awkwardly wraps an arm around his shoulders.

"Come on boy." he grumbles. "He'll be safe here."

"Yeah." he agrees absently, not really feeling it. He follows the burly man out the door, leaving his little brother in their capable hands.

\--

June 10, 1997

\--

Dean watches from the closet as his father hits his brother, wanting nothing more than to help, but knowing that he cannot give his position away. Not yet. His father was a great father, a great man, when he wasn't drinking, but he had been perpetually drunk for fourteen years, and Sam never knew the kinder father Dean had known. Its nights like these that are the worst and Dean still feels incredibly guilty he never realized the abuse his little brother was forced to endure. He had a duty as a big brother, and he failed him miserably.

"Lawrence Police Department. What's your emergency?" The person on the phone asks.

"My father is going to kill my brother." he whispers, his voice barely loud enough for her to hear.

"I am sorry, I didn’t catch that. Did you say your father is killing your brother?" She asks.

Sam screams in the background. "Please hurry." he whispers.

"What's your location?"

"Pines Motel on Ninth Street. Room 107." he winces at the sound of leather hitting his brother's back. "Hurry!"

"An officer in on the way." She says, "Can you stay on the line?"

"Yes." He breathes, looking out from the crack in the door.

"What's your name?" she asks.

"Dean Winchester and my brother's name is Sam." he answers.

There is a heavy silence from both ends after that, the only sound being faint crying and his father's yelling. Blaming Sam for their mother's death. Calling him a freak. An abomination. More hitting. More screaming and whimpering. The sound of the sirens is like the chorus of angels to the eighteen year old's ears. His father grabs a gun, stomping to the door, and Dean runs to his brother.

There are the sounds of guns firing. Dean clenches his eyes tightly shut. He feels Sam stiffen in fear beside him. The shooting stops, and an officer with kind smile and dark hair comes in. "Dean? Sam?" he nods hesitantly. "My name is Jody Mills. You're safe now." She holds out a hand, and he takes it. He tries to pull Sam to his feet, but he just pulls away and scuttles into a dark corner.

"Sam?" The scared hazel-green eyes of his brother turn to him, and he feels his heart clench. “We’re safe Sammy. “

\--

July 10, 2002

\--

Sam sits in the corner of his room looking longingly out the window. A blue butterfly lands on one of the iron bars caging him in, and then flies off with a few beats of its tiny wings. He frowns as he watches it. It is so free, so simple. He jumps at the clunking sound the lock makes as his door is unlocked. Nurse Masters pokes her head in.

“Hey Sweetie.” She speaks in a soft voice so she doesn’t startle of frighten him. “It’s time for lunch. Can you come out of your room for me?” He doesn’t move or acknowledge her words. “Please Sam?” he shivers and shakes his head. Meg sighs.

The blonde leaves the room, coming back a few seconds later with a tray full of food. There’s a salad, something Dean mentioned him liking, a small helping of Chicken Alfredo, a thing of jello, and a glass of apple juice. She sets it down a few feet from his corner, and sits down on the bed. Neither one moves. Neither one speaks. After a few minutes Sam scoots a tiny bit closer to the tray, and pushes it away, before sliding back into his corner. Meg Masters slides it back to him.

 “Come on Sammy.” She pleads. “You haven’t eaten in four days.” He pushes the tray towards her with his foot. “Can you just eat a little bit? I won’t make you eat anything else. Just eat something.”

Sam appears to consider it for a second, then nods and reaches over to the tray. He grabs a cup of lime jello, and the apple juice and eats slowly. Then he pushes the rest away and crawls back into the shadows. Meg gives him a happy smile, knowing not to discourage because progress is progress, even if it is only a tiny bit.

\--

July 16, 2002

\--

Sam’s first session with Ruby Kristen, the psychiatrist assigned to him, does not go well. She pushes too hard, and he panics.  He stabs her in the stomach with a pencil. It takes three doctors to hold him down so they can put him under. He doesn’t calm down for a long time, even with the sedatives. The only reason he does is because Nurse Meg Masters comes in and help him calm down. After he finally falls to the effects of the sedatives the staff talks. It is agreed after that, that Sam should attend sessions with Doctor Madison O’Brian, who is known for her kinder approach to her patients.

\--

July 28, 2002

\--

He seems to be going for the record. Sam hasn't slept in eight days. He hasn't eaten anything in six. There is only so long someone can last on nothing but orange juice.

Nothing anyone says seems to be changing his mind.

He still hasn't spoken a word.

They manage to get him to agree to sleep, but he wakes up after only a couple hours, screaming bloody murder.

It takes four hours to calm him down again.

\--

August 12, 2002

\--

Dean visits for the first time since he admitted his brother into Carver Edlund. He brings a few books and some soap.

The visit doesn’t go well. He’s worried about his brother. He asks about the therapy sessions, and Doctor Madison shows him as much as she can without breaking Doctor patient confidentiality.

He finally gets in to actually see his brother, but he happens to come at a bad moment.

He leaves the Hospital feeling ill, and wondering how long it will be until he stops having the nightmares. He barely misses knocking over some trench coat wearing dark haired man coming in, and isn’t sure he managed to apologize for nearly knocking him over.

\--

August 20, 2002

\--

Sam finally comes out of his room, but it isn’t by choice. The janitor has to clean the rooms, and he is forced out of the confines of Room 264 to brave the outside world.

He sits in a chair pushed into a corner, bundled up in blankets so that they can’t even see the blue hospital pants and white tee-shirt he’s wearing. About ten minutes later he’s joined by a man with whiskey golden brown eyes and hair to match. The man offers him a bar of chocolate, and Sam takes it hesitantly.

“My Name is Gabriel, and I’m an Archangel of the Lord.” The man introduces himself cheerfully. “What’s your name?”

Sam takes one of the colored markers from the table near them and writes his name on the guy’s palm.

“Can I call you Sammy?” he shakes his head.

“Sam-a-lam?” the face of displeasure causes Gabriel to laugh.

“No? How about Moose?” Sam gives him a look that clearly shows his incredulity at the name. “Alright! Moose it is!” Gabriel declares in a happy voice, taking a large bite out of his own chocolate bar.

Sam rolls his eyes and gives him a look.

“You know, for a guy that doesn’t talk much, you sure have one impressive bitch face.” He laughs.

Sam gives him a small and hesitant smile, but it causes the man to beam like a child on Christmas.

“Well, see ya around Sammich!” the man says with a wink as he wanders off.

Sam waves, and then gets up to go back to his newly cleaned room.

 He is unaware that the nurses have been staring in shock ever since Gabriel first came over to him. They can’t see how, in only a few seconds, he managed to crack Sam’s unbreakable thick shell a tiny bit, when they’ve gotten nowhere in the two months he’s been there.

But it is progress, so they won’t question it for now. So long as something is working.

\--

September 02, 2002

\--

Dean visits again. Sam is no longer curled in fetal position in the corner. Instead he’s sitting on the bed. He still looks tired and like he hasn’t been eating, but the change is so drastic that it makes dean take a double take. Bobby is with him this time.

“Hey Sam.” Dean smiles. “You look better.”

Sam scribbles something on a notepad and hands it to them. ‘ _Yeah, I guess._ ’It reads.

“Anything interesting happen?” he asks.

At the same time, bobby says. “That’s good. Who is she?”

Sam writes and hands them the pad. It says, _‘Dean, not really. I met another patient. Bobby, not a girl. His name is Gabriel, and he’s an angel.’_

“Way to go, Sammy.” Dean laughs. “I didn’t know you swung that way.”

Sam gives him an impressive bitch face. _‘I didn’t mean it that way. We are just friends. He really is an angel.’_

Dean and Bobby exchange tired looks. They had been told long before about Sam’s coping mechanism. He had somehow convinced himself that the people they were forced to kill with their father were monsters. While the nurses are reluctant to let anyone feed his delusions, they are not sure how he will act if they tell him. He is already in a fragile state of mind.

“And angels are good?” Bobby asks after the pause becomes too tense.

 _‘No. Most of them are dicks, but Gabriel and his brother Castiel are nice.’_ He scrawls in messy graphite.

“Castiel?” Dean asks. “Does he live here?”

Sam shakes his head. _‘Castiel is a doctor. Not here. He works at Sioux Falls General Hospital. He comes to visit sometimes. Gabriel is always in a better mood when he does.’_

“Oh? Why do you think that is?”

 _‘I haven’t asked. Seems rude.’_ He writes.

They continue their visit for another couple hours, but nothing important happens.

\--

September 06, 2002

\--

Gabriel Novak lapses. He tries to end his life by cutting his arms with a knife he somehow stole from the staffs kitchen. Sam finds him in the showers in a pool of his own blood when he goes to take his own shower. His screams alert the staff, who run in to find Sam trying to stop the bleeding, and Gabriel unconscious on the floor. He needs fifty-five stitches up each arm, but he survives. It doesn't change the emotional toll it has on Sam, who goes back to his nearly catatonic state.

It is not a secret around the hospital that Sam has an unnatural liking for the resident prankster, especially given how hard it is for him to open up to even those in his family.

He won't eat. He won't sleep. Even getting him to drink enough water to survive is a hassle. He curls himself up under his bed, wrapped up in a cocoon of all his blankets, with all the lights off and the blinds closed. He refuses to leave that spot.

He's not allowed to see Gabriel. They say that seeing him is not conclusive to getting Sam healed. He's not helping him heal.

Sam goes on strike and refuses to talk to his counselors or doctors. He won't even talk to Meg.

\--

September 13, 2002

\--

Dean comes to visit on the seventh day of his strike. He shows up to see Meg trying to coax Sam out from under the bed. There is a plate with his favorite foods sitting next to her, and she’s on her stomach talking to him. From how tired she looks, Dean can guess she’s been in the same position for a long time, trying to get his brother to eat. If he hadn’t already liked the blonde, he would now.

“Come on Sammy.” She says in a pleading but soothing voice. “I brought your favorites. Just a few bites, okay sweetheart? “

Sam doesn’t budge.

“Sam, just eat the food already.” Dean pleads, lying down next to the nurse.

Sam flips him off and sinks deeper into the shadows under the bed.

Meg gets a thoughtful look, like she’d struggling with an internal battle, and then sighs in resignation. “Okay sweetheart, I will make you a deal. If you eat all of this food, take a shower and a nap, and promise to talk to your councilor just a little bit tomorrow, even if you don’t use words, I will let you see Gabriel.”

Sam’s hazel eyes meet her own blue so fast they are sure he gave himself whiplash. He seems to study her, as if trying to determine if she’s lying. Apparently he is satisfied, because he crawls out from under the bed.

Seven days of not showering, or eating, or sleeping, and barely drinking anything has taken its toll on Sam. His hair is oily and unkempt, sticking out in all directions. His skin is pallid and pasty. Dark circles surround his bloodshot eyes. His lips are chapped and broken, the simplest of movements opening multiple cuts to bleed. His body shows the lack of eating, as he is noticeably thinner since the last time Dean saw him, and that was barely more than a week earlier.

As Sam obediently eats, albeit slowly, Dean takes Meg into a corner so they can talk.

It takes a little bit, due to her not wanting to break Patient Confidentiality, but she finally tells him everything. She tells him about Sam’s insomnia, and how he always wakes up screaming from the nightmares. She tells him about how he doesn’t talk to anyone, and ignores his counselors and doctors unless he has no choice otherwise. She tells him about how stubborn he is, and how he never comes out of his room. And then she tells him of Gabriel, who is Sam’s only friend. He is the one who drags him out of his room for at least a few minutes every day, and is the only one who has any chance of getting him to open up, even if it is a minuscule amount. She tells him of how in the beginning Sam wouldn't participate in any activities, but since meeting Gabriel he at least made some effort.

If Dean didn’t know better, he would think his broken little brother had developed a crush on him. It made him wonder what kind of person could get his brother to open up. He hadn’t opened up in five years, and he’d been keeping his cards close to his chest for a long time before then.

He takes his shower, and settles in for a nap. Of course he curls up in the darkness under the bed, be he still sleeps.

Dean gets to see firsthand how terrifying it is to watch him wake from his nightmares. It makes him feel guilty.

They don’t get to see Gabriel that night, but they promise he can see him the next day instead of going to therapy. It appeases him enough that he doesn’t go back in to his unresponsive state.

\--

September 14, 2002

\--

Gabriel is pale. He’s always been a bit pale, but he looks like a ghost. The mirth has been erased from his eyes. They are a greenish brown color with tiny gold flecks. Hazel brown similar to Sam’s own Hazel green. His hair is messy and not slicked back like he usually likes it. White bandages cover his arms from hand to elbow. His eyes light up when he sees Sam, and Dean pretends not to notice the way he goes from perfect example of depression to absolutely glowing in the instant he sees Sam.

“Hey Mr. Moose!” he says gleefully. Dean raises an eyebrow as his brother scribbles out an answer in purple glitter pen.

 _‘Shut up. You are just tiny. How are you?’_ Gabriel laughs.

“If you are wondering if I am planning on doing this again soon, then the answers no. Sorry you had to see that Sam-a-lam.” His eyes widen when Sam pulls him in for a quick hug, backing away before he even has the chance to respond. Dean can’t help but feel jealous. In the five years since their father was thrown in jail, Sam has not once given him a hug unless he initiated it first. “Well jeez Kiddo, didn’t know you cared so much.” He says jokingly, winking flirtingly at his brother. Sam returns with a shy half smile.

Gabriel seems to finally realize he is there, because he raises an eyebrow. “Who’s this chucklehead?” he questions. Sam makes a few movements with his hands. “Your brother?” he turns back to Dean. “You’re Dean Winchester?”

“Yeah.” He answers. “Sam talk much about me?”

“A little yeah.” He shrugs. “He says you are a good brother. All of my brothers are dead, except three. There are only four Angels left in all of heaven.”

Dean isn’t sure how to respond to that. So he doesn’t.

\--

September 18, 2002

\--

Gabriel’s younger brother Castiel has his twenty-second birthday in Carver Edlund Adult Psychiatric Hospital. They eat sugary frosted cupcakes from a bakery a few blocks over, and drink milkshakes from Scoopers. Castiel and Sam bond over old books they like, and Gabriel tells stories of the better parts of the birthday parties they used to have before he’d been admitted six years earlier.

Sam starts a cupcake revolution when he makes his into a sandwich. Within seconds everyone has torn the bottom of their cupcake and stuck it on the top.

It is a good day.

\--

October 1, 2002

\--

Doctor Madison O’Brian decides that Sam needs to start Group Art Therapy. She thinks he might be more willing to tell her about himself if he expresses it in a visual form. In the group she tells the patients to draw what they feel.

Sam paints a broken window overlooking a dead overgrown garden of thorns. An evil moon shows a shark toothed smile down upon the thorns, yellow eyes shining with malice. An evil looking shadow comes up to grip the jagged opening of the window. It is all in shades of grey and black except the eyes of the moon.

Madison tells him it’s a very sad and well-drawn representation of his feelings.

He ruins it by splashing it with crimson paint.

It gets everywhere.

\--

October 13, 2002

\--

Sam loses time.

It wasn’t very noticeable at first, which is probably why they didn’t notice until then.

He doesn’t remember what happens during these episodes.

He only knows he will black out and end up somewhere. Most of the time he can’t remember how he got there.

It concerns the nurses to no end.

\--

October 20, 2002

\--

Sam draws a jagged spiral of reds and blacks in Art Therapy.

It looks like he's falling down the rabbit hole, and in a way he might just be.

\--

October 22, 2002

\--

It is exactly the sixth anniversary of Gabriel’s arrival at the hospital. They manage to convince the doctors to let them all have a pizza party.

They decorate the ceilings with yellow and pink streamers, and play weird Egyptian dance music because Gabriel apparently likes dancing to it. Sam learns that he’s a good dancer. He stays in tucked up against the wall, just watching him dance happily.

He ends up falling asleep on Gabriel’s shoulder while they play with a deck of cards the Nurses were nice enough to give them.

He has the first good dream he can remember having for a long time.

\--

October 31, 2002

\--

The nurses pass out sugar free candies to everyone and they are allowed to make Paper Mache masks with the nurse’s supervision.

Gabriel’s mask looks like a fox. Like a trickster spirit. It is appropriate.

Sam wears moose antlers after Gabriel pleads him to. While he doesn’t talk to anyone or get close to them, he doesn’t hide in his room.

Until Ruby shows up dressed like a clown.

Then they don’t see him for the rest of the day.

Gabriel and Sam spend Halloween on Gabriel’s bed eating candy his brother brought him, and listening to cheesy monster movie sound tracks.

\--

November 2, 2002

\--

It is the anniversary of the day John Winchester killed Mary Winchester.

Sam doesn’t leave the room.

Dean stays in the room with him and they listen to his mother’s favorite songs, and Dean brings eggplant parmesan from the Olive Garden, which was their mother’s favorite dish.

If they both cry uncontrollably for the entire day, nobody needs to know.

\--

November 6, 2002

\--

It’s Lucifer Novak’s birthday. Gabriel is allowed to leave the hospital to visit his comatose brother in Sioux Falls.

When he gets back, it is snowing. Sam doesn’t comment on the tears in his eyes, or the way he can’t even crack a joke. He knows it was probably a nightmare to see his brother still sleeping after all these years. He knows how terrifying it must be to have them tell him, over and over, that his brother may never wake.

Sam just hugs the smaller man as he cries miserably on his shoulder.

They build a pillow fort in the communal room; which the patients have lovingly dubbed the Octopus, on account of the eight corridors stretching out to make the halls that hold their rooms. They use the thin blue and white sheets and blankets from their rooms, even a few stolen from the linen closet, and create a small fort with enough room to fit them both inside it.

The nurses find them sleeping there the next morning when the go to set up for breakfast. No one wants to wake them up, because it is the first time either has looked peaceful in sleep that they can remember.

\--

November 11, 2002

\--

Dean visits with Bobby, and they finally get to meet Castiel.

Dean and Castiel stare at each other so intensely that the entire hospital starts placing bets on how long it will take for them to get together.

Sam smiles for the first time without Gabriel’s coaxing as he places a bet on their brother’s being too stubborn to get together until something pushes them together.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone as much as it does that Gabriel agrees whole heartedly.

\--

November 15, 2002

\--

Ruby decides it would be a good idea to try and help Sam get over his fear of clowns.  She decides a direct approach would be the best way, and convinces most of the staff to dress as clowns. He wakes up from one of his nightly nightmares to find his entire room decorated with pictures of clowns, and the doctors and nurses standing around his bed in happy grease paint.

He lapses.

And, He lapses badly.

\--

November 28, 2002

\--

Instead of spending Thanksgiving peacefully like he’d planned, Dean is forced to come down to the hospital.

Sam had stopped taking care of himself again. It had been nine days since he slept, and thirteen since he ate. He fell into a coma, and he was being tube fed so that he would survive.

Ruby was fired.

Gabriel was a wreck. It was bad enough that one of his brother’s was in a coma with a very slim chance of ever waking up, his other brother rarely had time to visit with his job, and his other brother lived in England with his eccentric boyfriend and never visited.  It was bad enough that everyone else in his whole large family killed each other Hunger Game Style when his father left. Looking at his best friend in the same condition as his older brother broke him.

\--

December 04, 2002

\--

The first thing Gabriel Novak did after Sam Winchester woke up was punch him squarely in the face.

The next thing he did was kiss him, and tell him that if he ever did that again, not waking up would be the least of his worries.

Neither mentioned the kiss later. Neither was ready to even contemplate what it could have meant.

\--

December 24, 2002

\--

Sam and Gabriel both get letters from their families, telling them they wouldn’t be able to visit them over Christmas.

\--

December 25, 2002

\--

They spend Christmas in the Octopus with the other patients, listening to Christmas carols, and drinking hot caramel-cocoa, and eating frosted sugar cookies.

The nurses ask them all to tell a story to spread the holiday cheer.

Gabriel shares a story about how he and his brothers built snowmen back when he was just a kid, and how his mother made the most divine peppermint fudge ever made.

Sam didn’t say anything, but he had Gabriel and Meg relay a short story about Dean sneaking into someone’s house to steal presents out from under their tree so they could have Christmas.

Meg is forced to kiss Madison as they walk under the mistletoe. Neither seems to mind. Gabriel and Sam exchange knowing looks.

\--

December 31, 2002

\--

The end of the year came in no time.

Everyone put their resolutions on the board, looking forward to another year. A better year.

Staff and Patient alike watched the ball drop from the communal room.

_5…_

_4…_

_3…_

_2…_

_1…_

Gabriel kisses Sam.


End file.
